


While You Can

by kaguneko (alittlecoco)



Category: Gintama
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dadtoki, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, M/M, Platonic Bedsharing, See notes for other tags, Smoking & Drinking, background kyuutae, i got that sweet sweet depression and a full-time job, love you all, nonbinary & genderfluid characters, not sure how angsty my angst really is though, slice of life more than anything really, uh sorry i haven't written anything in ages, wedding crasher au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-17 16:13:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 18,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14192784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlecoco/pseuds/kaguneko
Summary: Hijikata attends (suffers through) a number of weddings over the summer. So does Gintoki. One of them was actually invited, one of them definitely wasn't.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Baby's first (but hopefully not last) Gintama fic.

 

Hijikata liked spring the best.He remembered this fact every year when it returned in the nick of time, like an old friend that traveled too much and never stayed as long as he’d like.  Spring in the city was a short-lived thing, making Hijikata’s heart sore in a way he didn’t mind terribly.Pretty things were like that.So were good friends.

The cherry blossoms that year were already falling, scattering a pale, sunrise-pink halo around Hijikata where he sat, leaning against a tree in the empty park.

 

*

*

*

 

“Toshi,” Kondo began over lunch earlier that day in a tone that had Hijikata immediately bracing himself.“Let me treat today.”

Hijikata narrowed his eyes.“Why?”Usually, this particular _Toshi_ came with a scheme that had Hijikata pinching his nose between his fingers and agreeing with a sigh that could sink a battleship.

Kondo smiled too wide.“Spring is the season of love, Toshi.”He spread his hands, palm up like some kind of benevolent statue.Like he was remotely convincing.He probably thought he was.

“Fuck off,” Hijikata replied mildly, glancing out the window.It was warm and golden outside, and he had the afternoon off.He thought he might visit the park near his apartment before all the petals had fallen.He hadn’t been since last year.Or, Hijikata frowned, maybe that staff picnic had been the year before.He sighed, fingers twitching towards his jacket pocket as he flicked his gaze back toward Kondo.

Kondo leaned back against the sticky vinyl booth, kicking his feet up to rest on Hijikata’s bench.His grin was frozen in place and Hijikata was suspicious as hell.“I’ll buy my own lunch,” he said slowly.

“No, no let me get this, Toshi.”

“Get your feet away from me, they stink.”

“They don’t!”

“Kondo,” Hijikata growled softly.

Kondo ignored him and leaned forward across the table, eyes wide.“Toshi, I need you to be my date,” he said in a rush.

Hijikata blinked.“Eh?”

“Matsudaira wants me to show face at events this summer.”

“Ah.” _Matsudaira_ probably couldn’t be assed attending them himself.

“Weddings, Toshi.”

“I see.”

“So many weddings.”

Hijikata put an unlit cigarette in his mouth.“That’s shitty,” he said blandly.

Kondo’s brows had climbed higher and higher on his forehead along with the rising, panicked pitch of his voice.“Toshi, don’t make me do this alone.”

Hijikata sighed the battleship-sinking sigh.“Bring Sougo.”He mentally dug through his wardrobe.He needed to buy a new suit.

“Are you insane?”Kondo tapped his feet against Hijikata’s hip.

Hijikata batted at his shoes.“Get those things away from me if you want me to say yes.”

Kondo’s face broke into a brilliant grin that wrinkled his nose.“I love you,” he said.

A soft cough had them looking up to see their waiter hovering with the check, frowning at the cigarette dangling from Hijikata’s lips.Hijikata smiled at him, teeth bared around the cigarette.“Actually, I’d like another of these.”He gestured to his empty bowl, “Please.”The kid turned a bit green, like he had when he brought their meals over earlier, holding Hijikata’s as if it might bite him.

“To go,” Hijikata added.He glanced at Kondo, who appeared to be trying—and failing—not to laugh.“He’s paying,” he said, tilting his head towards the bastard, who’s laughter was terribly contagious, Hijikata thought as the waiter let out a tiny, nervous giggle.

“Your smiles are scary, Toshi,” Kondo muttered as the waiter walked away with a flushed neck, shaking his head slightly above stiff shoulders.

Hijikata offered one of those grins to Kondo.“And here I thought you loved me.”

 

*

*

*

 

Blossoms fluttered to land in Hijikata’s lap, quiet as falling snow.The silence was heavy against his eardrums after Kondo’s booming laughter and the thrumming chatter in the restaurant.

Hijikata picked at the hem of his jacket and was half-heartedly wondering if the Department would cover the cost of a new suit when a piercing shriek had his head snapping up, cracking against the tree-trunk in flash of white-sharp pain.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he hissed, catching a glimpse of red streaking between the nearby trees as he prodded at his scalp for blood.

“Oi!” a man shouted a moment later.And then yelped, nearly tripping over Hijikata’soutstretched legs.“My bad,” he said breathlessly, catching himself with a clumsy stumble while Hijikata flinched out of the way with another hiss, clutching his take-away bag.Without sparing Hijikata a glance, the man scrambled after that flash of red.“Get back here, you little _monster_ ,” he panted.“Shit, I’m too old to chase you.”

Hijikata watched him stagger off, curious, his fingers twitching towards his pocket.Sticks and leaves stuck out of the man’s messy hair and Hijikata thought he’d glimpsed what looked a lot like dirt smeared all over his face.Flower petals fell from his arms where he tried to hold onto a pile of them, some having spilled over Hijikata’s legs when the man stumbled.Despite his silvery white hair, though, he didn’t appear to be much older than Hijikata.

“Sorry about that,” came a soft, polite voice.Hijikata jumped for a third time and wrenched his gaze away from the man to see a teenage boy staring solemnly at him from behind thick glasses.On his head, slipping haphazardly over his ear, was roughly made flower crown.

Hijikata frowned and was about to say that it was fine, really—and for some reason it _was_ fine really—but another piercing shriek had both him and the boy turning to see the little red streak tackling the man to the ground in a cloud of laughter and blossoms and a pained grunt.

“Kagura!” the boy yelped, sprinting off towards them, holding his flower crown to his head with a hand.The man growled and rubbed petals into what Hijikata realized was the brilliant red hair of a little girl while she laughed and laughed, batting at his hands.

“He’s old, Kagura, you have to be gentle,” the boy fretted. With a loud squawk, he was abruptly tugged down into the heap of limbs as well.

“’m not that old, jeeze,” the man grumbled, sitting up and plucking a stick out of his hair, examining it absently.His voice was low and pleasant and warm as the spring sun.  The flower crown had made it's way to onto his head, though it was harder to see with the mess of curls.Hijikata looked away and stood quickly, brushing dirt from his pants, feeling suddenly alien and a little brittle.The little girl laughed as loud as Kondo, he thought fleetingly as her giggles chased him all the way out of the park.The sharp edges of the sound were softened by that low, warm voice.Hijikata sped up to out-distance the rumble of it.The last thing heard as he bolted out the park gate was the boy’s fretful voice yelping, _“Kagura!”_ and a deep, loud burst of laughter.

 

 

Hijikata smoked as he walked back to his empty apartment, resolutely smothering the clinging scent of cherry blossoms and dirt.He wondered how many weddings was,  _“So many weddings, Toshi,_ " and really hoped the Department covered the cost of a new suit.

When he'd let himself into his apartment, he froze in the entryway, staring down at the shower of bruised petals he’d scattered across the floor when he shrugged off his jacket.  He realized with a sharp pang that he’d left his bag of take-away at the park beneath the tree.

Spring made his heart sore.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Kondo blew his nose loudly enough that Hijikata had trouble hearing the vows.The woman sitting next to Kondo patted his arm gently and offered him a crumpled tissue.Hijikata’s fingers twitched.He wanted a cigarette so badly he gnashed his teeth together.

“They wrote the vows themselves,” the woman whispered to Kondo in a gentle, understanding tone.She looked like someone’s aunt, soft and greying, and Hijikata would bet she smelled like bread and lavender.Maybe she was related to the bride and groom.Hijikatawouldn’t know as he’d never seen the couple in his life, and Kondo _definitely_ wouldn’t know as Hijikata doubted he could see as far as the alter through his tears and swollen eyelids.But Kondo, being Kondo, blew his nose harder and nodded, leaning into her hand.Hijikata sighed and tapped his fingers against his leg.His new suit was stiff and the chapel was stuffy, clogging his nose with dust and perfume.

A line of sweat trickled down his back.Turned out Department hadn’t agreed to pay for the suit he was sweating all over.

 

 

As it was, they’d had breakfast with Sougo that morning at Hijikata’s favorite diner.Kondo paid, and it was definitely a bribe.Which was just fine by Hijikata since he was pretty certain Matsudaira had also bribed Kondo with a cash bonus to attend the wedding season in his stead.  Something seedy and under-the-table like that.But meals with Sougo, free or not, usually ended with at least one casualty and Hijikata had waited for it, tense as he drank too much stale coffee.  It was sour and lingered like cigarettes at the back of his tongue.

Sougo was subdued, though, only flinging insults when Hijikata stared a little too carefully at his face, looking for a slump in the line of the kid’s shoulders.He didn’t find one, but his own retorts were softer than he meant, which fucked them both off.They snarled quietly at each other while Kondo beamed.He threw an arm around Sougo and kicked his feet up in the booth next to Hijikata.Neither one of them pushed him away.

As they parted ways Sougo paused, glancing up at Kondo, squinting a little in thewatery-bright morning sun.Summer had come too fast this year, and Hijikata missed spring.

“I’m guessing you didn’t hear, then,” Sougo said.

“Hear what?” Hijikata asked, narrowing his eyes.

“Not you,” Sougo dismissed.

Kondo tilted his head.“Hear what?”

Sougo frowned and Hijikata tensed, never sure if the kid was being sincere or not.The sunlight turned his eyes the color of bloody mud.

“Shimura’s engaged,” Sougo told him, calm and dull as ever.

Hijikata winced.

Kondo had smiled, which looked a lot like a tear-streaked grimace and gripped Hijikata’s shoulder too hard, stating that he was so happy he could cry.Hijikata had winced again, and muttered that he _was_ crying.

 

 

Next to him, Kondo was _still_ crying.The older woman calmly handed over another tissue.This one had lipstick stains on it.

Hijikata counted beams in the ceiling and wondered if all weddings dragged on quite so long.He doubted Shimura’s would, and somehow he didn’t see her getting married in a church, either.She didn’t seem the white wedding type.

He’d seen her once, about a year ago, with the person she was now engaged to.He’d been walking through the red-light district with Sougo on their way back to the police car.  It was the end of a patrol and the sun was just slipping away, gilding the district with fading gold.  

“Say, Hijikata,” Sougo had drawled.“Isn’t that the woman Kondo’s in love with?”

“Thinks he’s in love with,” Hijikata corrected absently.As far as he could tell, Kondo had never successfully exchanged more than three words with her and had mostly given up trying in recent months.

Hijikata was starving and summer threw a stifling, wet blanket over the city.  The red-light district always held the heat the worst, claustrophobic despite the charming spill of golden light.He tugged irritably at his cravat and lit a cigarette.

“Who’s that, then?”

Hijikata glanced in the direction Sougo pointed and did a double-take.The woman giggling a few paces away looked nothing like the person Hijikata was used to catching glimpses of, usually armed with her bared teeth and snarls and smiles like sword strokes.She tossed her head back on a bright, surprised laugh, cheeks flushed.  Her hair was a mess, like someone had been kissing her thoroughly.Hijikata blinked.A slender person with equally mussed dark hair and blushing ears stood in front of her, leaning in close to tap lightly at Shimura’s nose and murmur something too soft to catch.Shimura gazed down at them and smiled so gently Hijikata looked away, just catching sight of her pressing their foreheads together out of the corner of his eye as he turned on his heel.  He hated that brittle feeling in his ribs, like they weren't quite sturdy enough to hold his heart.

“No one will ever look at you like that,” Sougo said softly.Hijikata swallowed painfully.He heard the unspoken _“again,”_ echoing round and round and round.It ricocheted off the walls of the buildings where they pressed in, looming.  They were going to crush him and his stupidly fragile ribs.

“I’m hungry,” he grunted, “let’s go.”He wasn’t, not anymore.

 

 

In the chapel Hijikata’s chest was being crushed by the weight of all the weddings he had to attend that summer.Kondo let out a hideously loud, hysterical hiccup that made one of the unfortunate people seated a pew up turn to glare at them.Hijikata debated lighting up in the chapel.Or lighting the chapel up.

When the bride and groom finally kissed, Hijikata heaved a sigh that earned him more stares than all of Kondo’s crying.

“Toshi,” Kondo said as they were getting up to leave.His voice cracked.Hijikata’s ass ached from the wooden pews and his stiff suit was damp with sweat.He’d left a wet patch on the wood.Resisting the urge to drag his hand down his face, he looked at Kondo and his red-rimmed eyes.

“Yeah?” he muttered.

“Can you finish this for me?” Kondo looked a lot like a lost puppy when he was sad.His hair drooped along with the corners of his mouth.

“There better be free booze,” Hijikata said.

Kondo gripped his shoulder, over the bruise he’d left that morning.His smile was watery and a little wobbly, but wide as ever.

“She’s happy, y’know,” Hijikata said softly.He tried not to think about how damn _soft_ Shimura’s face had been when she looked down at that slip of a person she was marrying.The walls of the chapel felt like the buildings in the red-light district that evening.

“I’m happy she’s happy.”

“You’re a mess.”

“I owe you, Toshi.”

“I’ll take some free booze,” Hijikata said, waving him off.Then he said, more gently, “Go easy tonight, alright?Call Sougo.I’m sure he’ll drink his non-existent feelings with you.”

Kondo saluted him with a goofy, muddled up expression on his face—half heartbreak, half bone-deep gratitude—and left Hijikata to watch his retreating back.He placed an unlit cigarette between his lips.His sigh could have sank an entire fleet of ships.

“What a nice young man,” said the woman Kondo had been sitting beside.When she rested a hand on Hijikata’s arm, he caught a whiff of citrus, vibrant and not at all what he’d been expecting.

Hijikata smiled faintly.

She winked at him and looped her arm through his to be escorted from the chapel.

“I hear it’s a cash bar,” she whispered, leaning in conspiratorially.Her laughter, when Hijikata groaned in dismay, was citrus-bright as well.

It was shame Kondo had left, he thought, as he walked her out.They’d have gotten along magnificently.

 

 

* * *

 

  

To Hijikata’s sharp relief, the reception seemed was casual enough.It was held in a nearby venue that Hijikata recognized from a work banquet several years before.Hijikata wondered if there was still a dent in the wall at the back of the room where Yamazaki had nearly crashed through it. He looked around, took in the assigned seating and the dance floor and—god forbid—the _cash bar_ , and beelined for the bathroom, fishing for his phone to text Kondo and ask him just how the hell long he was supposed to stay.

 _The family donates a lot to the Police Department_ , Kondo had said, which was apparently why Matsudaira insisted they make an appearance at this wedding.

 _How much is a lot?_ Hijikata was, as a rule, extremely skeptical of Kondo’s perception of the world.

_Enough to fund the new training facility._

_Fuck_ , Hijikata had grumbled, rubbing at the back of his neck.The new training facility was the best thing that had happened to the Department in years.

 _Yeah_ , Kondo sighed. _You look good in a suit, though._

 _That really doesn’t make me feel better_. _Think Matsudaira’ll refund me for it?_

_It’s good to dream, Toshi._

 

“Fuck,” Hijikata sighed.The bathroom was gloriously air-conditioned and quiet.Maybe he could eat dinner in there.He didn’t have any food in his apartment so he might as well eat the  _free_ food, he reasoned, leaning up against the cool countertop and glancing at his face in the mirror.He had red splotches high on his cheekbones and his hair stuck in clumps to his forehead.A laugh burbled at the back of his throat when he thought about what a goddamn mess he and Kondo must have looked at the wedding.The higher-ups would probably regret sending them.If he was lucky, they wouldn’t make him attend another.

He wondered what the limit was for what he’d do for free food.

Hijikata was about to turn on the tap and wash his face when a toilet flushed and someone exited the stall behind him.He glanced up instinctively and stared.And stared and stared.For a moment, he heard shrieking laughter over the rush of blood in his ears, could smell cherry blossoms and dirt, clear as day.It had been over a month, but…

“ _You_ ,” he said distantly, part of himself still sitting in the park, a thousand miles away.

The man cocked his head and looked puzzled as he met Hijikata’s eyes in the mirror.A strand of messy, silvery hair flopped across his forehead.“Hm?” he hummed.He shoved a hand up through the curls and raked his eyes over Hijikata, from his damp hair to his new, creaking shoes.His eyes skipped back up to hover over Hijikata’s face.There was a crease between his pale brows.  After a moment, he shrugged and moved to stand beside Hijikata to wash his hands.“Me,” he said.

Hijikata looked down at the tap, feeling that brittle, alien sensation crackling in his chest again.He hadn’t been back to the park since that afternoon; the Department had been run ragged as it always was when spring-fever hit the city.But he’d wondered sometimes, about the man with the twigs in his hair and the kids that looked nothing like him.

“You,” came that voice over the sound of the water.Hijikata’s fingers twitched against the tap.So he _did_ remember.When Hijikata glanced up to find the man watching him in the mirror, he grinned at Hijikata, a lopsided thing that dimpled one of his cheeks.“You shy?”

Hijikata blinked.“Am I… what?”

“You know.Like, pee-shy.I can leave if you’ve gotta shit.”The man dragged his gaze across Hijikata’s sweaty hairline.“You look like you might need to.”His eyes were as bizarre a color as his hair, something like bloodstained mahogany, and they were bright with what Hijikata was certain was laughter as his expense.

“Fuck off,” Hijikata snapped, wrenching on the tap too hard, and ducking his head to splash water on his burning face.He could feel the man’s eyes on the exposed back of his neck and gritted his teeth, trying not to think about how the second thing he’d thought after that burst of recognition was that the man—with his warm voice and laughing kids and goddamn flower crowns—looked so effortlessly _good_ in a black button-down and dark jeans with his messenger back slung across his chest, and how relieved Hijikata's heart seemed to be to see him again.  It hurt, more than Hijikata would have expected, that the  guy from the park turned out to be a massive asshole.  He splashed his face more aggressively than he meant to.

Besides, who the _fuck_ left their shirt unbuttoned that far down?Hijikata was furious and his fingers itched for a cigarette.Or dirt to smear back on the man’s face where it belonged.

When he lifted his head though, dripping water all over the counter, he was met with soft silence and paper towels pushed gently against his cheek.Hijikata sputtered, rearing back.

“You’re gonna get your suit soaked,” said the man, turning off the tap for him as Hijikata gingerly accepted the paper towels.He scrubbed the rough paper over his face and was just glancing up with a “ _thank you_ ,” on the tip of his tongue when the man’s mouth curled on another grin, eyes flickering around Hijikata’s sweat-stained shirt collar.“Well, more soaked than it already is, I mean.”

Hijikata lobbed the used paper towel at his stupid, exposed chest and turned on his heel with a snarl, hands in fists at his side.That rich laughter floated after Hijikata like it had that day in the park and Hijikata _hated_ it.

 

 

The table Hijikata had been assigned to was full of people he only dimly recalled meeting at some event or another and had frankly had no interest in meeting ever again.He looked at Kondo’s empty chair. _Bastard_ , he thought bitterly.His cheeks felt hot.He tugged at the knot of his tie.

“Vice Chief!” cried a man from across the table when Hijikata had taken off his jacket, praying his back wasn’t visibly damp, and sat gingerly.The man’s face was flushed like he’d already hit the cash bar hard.Hijikata envied him.

He attempted a smile. _Your smiles are scary, Toshi_ , he heard Kondo mumble in the back of his head, and, well, Kondo could just shut the fuck up since he’d ditched Hijikata and was probably drunk and watching bad television with Sougo and Hijikata would give just about anything to be there with them right now.He glanced around the room like someone would rescue him, and then told his brain that it could just shut the fuck up, too, when he realized he was looking for a mess of silvery hair.Hijikata attempted to smile a little harder.He must not have failed too badly, since the man grinned back and hooted, “Vice Chief!” again, raising his glass.He wore a paper crown from a fast-food restaurant on his balding head and the whole thing might have been funny if Hijikata wasn’t still bristling after realizing the man from the park was an asshole.Flower crowns. _Fuck_.

Hijikata figured he was supposed to bleat the name of the man back at him, but he had no idea who he was, so he just raised his water glass and smiled wider.His cheeks hurt. _Kondo, so help me god_ — The beaming man’s gaze flickered to just the space just above Hijikata’s shoulder.

“Your smiles are a little bit scary,” murmured a low, horribly familiar voice, close enough to his ear that Hijikata could feel his breath ghosting hot across his skin.The hair on the back of his neck stood on end.“Don’t force them so much.Are you sure you don’t need to shit?”

Hijikata inhaled sharply, frozen in his seat, and got a lungful of spicy, earthy hell. “What the _fuck_ ,” Hijikata exhaled more loudly than he meant.Paper Crown across the table blinked and his smile faltered.

Hijikata watched in slow-motion horror as the man from the park pulled out Kondo’s chair and sat down as smoothly as if he belonged here, kicking his bag under his chair.

“Sorry, I’m late,” he said to Hijikata like they knew each other.Irritation flared in Hijikata’s chest all over again that the man didn’t even recognize him, which was completely irrational.And that made him burn hot all over again.

“You,” Hijikata growled uselessly.He needed to stick his head in the sink again.

“Me,” the man said again, laughter playing at the edges of his voice and tugging at his mouth.

“ _Ohh_ ,” purred the woman seated next to Hijikata.“ _That’s_ not the Chief of Police.”Hijikata turned to look at her.She smiled like a goddamn wolf, flicking hair out of her eyes.It was such a dark shade of red it was nearly purple.Hijikata decided in that moment that red was an unlucky color, and fuck any fool who claimed otherwise.

“Do introduce us, Vice Chief.”She tilted her head.Hijikata was momentarily distracted by the smattering of freckles across her face.There were so many Hijikata wondered if anyone had ever taken the time to count all of them.It was… nice.Pretty.  But then she was talking, syrupy sweet again, and Hijikata retracted his thought.“ _Please_ , Vice Chief.Who’s _this_?”She held a glass of wine daintily by the stem, waving it in their direction, and Hijikata considered offering a trade.Wine for the silver-haired asshole from the park.

Hijikata glanced back at the man sitting in Kondo’s seat and for a moment, his eyes widened ever so slightly above his smirk.He didn’t say a thing and didn’t appear to breathe as he held Hijikata’s gaze.Hijikata tilted his head, frowning, thinking of the little ball of red hurdling herself towards him, and the boy with the flower crown.And sticks in his hair and dirt on his face.The red in his eyes reminded Hijikata of Sougo and another, softer mahogany.Suddenly Hijikata’s chest was sore like it had been when he’d sat in the halo of cherry blossoms that afternoon.

He had no idea what expression he was making, but the man relaxed nearly imperceptibly, eyes crinkling at the corners as he tilted his head at Hijikata in return.

Reeling slightly, Hijikata turned back to the woman.“He’s—” Hijikata floundered.

“An old friend,” cut in that horrible voice.Hijikata hated every rumbling note of it.He whipped his head around to glare at the man, who grinned brightly.“Don’t be shy,” he managed around the beginnings of laughter.

“I’m _not_ shy.”

The man coughed into his hand and wiped at the corners of his mouth.Like that would get the shit-eating grin off his face.

“Vice Chief!” hooted Paper Crown across the table again.

Hijikata considered putting his face in his hands.“Sir!” he replied weakly.The man looked pleased enough.His plus-one from hell shook with laughter.Hijikata wanted whatever the man across the table was pounding back.Desperately.

The man sitting beside the freckly redhead coughed lightly.“Pardon,” he said.He had a gentle voice and Hijikata looked at him, hoping beyond hope for a lifeline. _Please_ —“Please introduce us, Vice Chief,” he murmured politely.Hijikata thought of all the newspaper articles describing him as thorny and friendless and unapproachable.Which wasn’t exactly true, but it also wasn’t _not_ true.  They were probably curious as to who the hell had tried to befriend the prickly Vice Chief of Police.

Hijikata glanced at the ceiling and prayed for it to cave in.A warm hand on his shoulder made him jump.He wanted to lean into it for half a moment because it was like a bit of sunshine had made it into this godawful reception, but then—

“Apologies, my friend is shy.”The man leaned around Hijikata to beam at Freckles and the soft-spoken man.

Hijikata shook his hand off with a growl of irritation.“Go on, then.Introduce yourself.” _Asshole_.He waved a hand at the table and stuffed an unlit cigarette into his mouth, glaring at the man he was absolutely _certain_ was crashing the reception.He wished he knew why he hadn’t told the man to fuck off yet.

The man shrugged and smiled, easy as anything.If he was surprised as well that Hijikata was playing along, he didn’t let on.The curve of his mouth was less manic and it didn’t dimple his cheek, though his eyes danced, wildly alive despite the way they drooped down at the corners.

“Just Gintoki is fine,” he said, looking directly at Hijikata as he spoke, gaze alighting on the cigarette dangling between his lips with amusement.After a beat, he cleared his throat and looked around the table.“Apologies,” he said, sickeningly contrite, "lost my train of thought.”He glanced at Hijikata again.“I’m Gintoki,” he told the table.Freckles let out a soft whistle.

“Fuck’s sake,” Hijikata muttered.  The blood rushing in his ears made its way across his face.

Every single set of eyes at the table was fixed on them and Hijikata was acutely reminded of the rabid way Sougo and Kondo stared, transfixed, at bad soaps on TV.Next time, Hijikata vowed, he was bringing cash.And a flask.Better to cover all his bases.

“How did you meet, Hijikata-san?” a young woman was saying over the sound phantom police sirens wailing in Hijikata’s tired head.He glanced at her, frowning.He _did_ remember this woman he realized, and he liked her more than the others, if he recalled properly.He was pretty sure she was a writer.Had he read her book?He thought Yamazaki had, maybe.Hadn’t shut up about it for a week straight…

The man— _Gintoki_ —shifted next to him, catching his attention.“Mmm,” he hummed,leaning an elbow on the table and resting his chin in his palm as he gazed at Hijikata.“How _did_ we meet, _Hijikata_?”

Hijikata flinched visibly at the use of his name.The dimple was back, creasing Gintoki’s cheek.Hijikata wanted to shove his thumb into it.Gintoki’s expression faltered for a moment and he glanced pointedly at the table.  Hijikata realized he was staring.

“Sorry,” he gritted.“I lost my train of thought,” he growled just loudly enough for Gintoki to catch.He glanced at the writer.“In the park,” he said shortly, feeling another hot burst of irritation.He wanted to say, _He nearly broke his neck tripping over me with an armload of flowers because he is an idiot.Clearly_.But he thought of the way the man wheezed and let the kid tackle the shit out of him and snapped his mouth shut.

Freckles whistled again.“Do you really need to do that every time?” he asked her.

She shrugged.“Probably.”Hijikata amended his thought again.The freckles were pretty, and her shit-eating expression was nice.Just not directed at him.Red was still an unlucky color, though.

“Childhood friends,” Gintoki was saying beside him.“I used to watch his goldfish on school holidays.”He smirked at Hijikata when he realized he was listening.“Say, Hijikata.”He tilted his head.“Did it ever grow bigger?I know you were worried about the little bugger.”

There was the whistle again.

Hijikata gaped for a moment.Frowned.And then let out a hoarse, shocked wheeze of laughter.Gintoki blinked at him, brows shooting up into his messy bangs at his reaction before the corner of his mouth quirked up slightly.  His expression made another bark of laughter slip out of Hijikata's chest.

“Shit,” Hijikata sighed, dragging a hand over his face.He looked at the wide eyes trained on them.This man was somehow _worse_ than a bad soap.“Satisfied?” he asked them as coldly as he could manage, hoping he was every inch the thorny Vice Chief of Police.

The writer gulped, Paper Crown looked dazed, and the soft-spoken man ducked his head to hide a smile.Hijikata didn’t even want to look at the expression on the woman next to him.Blessedly, because occasionally things worked out for Hijikata, one of the waiters stopped at their table to tell them it was their turn to go up to the buffet.

Hijikata hadn’t even noticed dinner had begun.Irritation hummed all the way down his spine.

 

Gintoki crowded close to him on the way to the buffet, nearly stepping on his heels.Hijikata was glad he couldn’t smell him over the food.It might put him off dinner.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he snapped when Gintoki bumped into his back, nearly knocking Hijikata into the person in front of him.

“Crashing a wedding, what does it look like?” Gintoki hissed bringing his mouth to Hijikata’s ear again.

“No, I got _that_.I mean back _up_ , for fuck’s sake.It’s too hot.”Hijikata snarled and whirled, nearly cracking his nose against Gintoki’s cheek.He blinked, surprised to find that Gintoki was nearly the same height as himself.He’d seemed much taller in the bathroom.

Gintoki leaned back slightly, eyes lidded and endlessly amused.He cocked his head.“Are you going to arrest me?”

Hijikata bared his teeth.Leaning forward, he hissed, “You’re a goddamn idiot, aren’t you?”

This time Gintoki didn’t pull back.“Hijikata,” he said quietly.

“What,” Hijikata growled softly, blinking again as Gintoki’s breath hit him square in the face.

Gintoki flashed a brilliant grin.“Your turn.”

“My _what_?”

Gintoki placed a hand on Hijikata’s waist and spun him around to face the buffet.“You’re holding up the line.”  He tapped his fingers against Hijikata's hip.

Hijikata narrowly resisted cracking his head intentionally against Gintoki’s.“Back.Up.”He snarled, glaring at the buffet.

Gintoki let out a small noise that sounded like, “ _Oh.”_ His hand was gone from Hijikata’s waist in an instant, and he was backing off, taking his body heat with him.Hijikata shuddered like a dog to get rid of the feeling.He eyed the food in front of them for a beat before loading his plate, suddenly starving.  He never remembered to eat enough during the day when it was so hot.

Next to him, Gintoki somehow piled even more food on his plate.

Hijikata raised a brow at him.

Gintoki shrugged.“Eat while you can, eh?”He grinned, different from the manic one, and not at all like the softer one.Hijikata didn’t think he liked this one.

He frowned at the strange man next to him and turned back to the buffet.“Whatever,” he muttered.He cast his eyes over the condiments.“Damn.”

Gintoki crowded too close again, so Hijikata nudged him with his elbow.Gintoki just dodged and leaned over his shoulder, peering at the selection.“What’re you looking for?”He reached across Hijikata to fumble with the ketchup, spilling some on Hijikata’s plate as he did so.

“Nothing,” Hijikata muttered, jerking his dinner out of the way.He looked at Gintoki’s overflowing plate.“You’re going to spill.”He turned and stalked back to their table, positive he was sweating through his white dress shirt.He really should have brought cash.And a personal fan.Next time.Then again, next time Gintoki wouldn’t be there and Hijikata hoped beyond hope the venue would be better air-conditioned.He loosened his tie and looked down at his plate.The meal looked so dry.Free food was free food, though, he supposed with a sigh, still wishing deep in his heart that he could eat in the bathroom.

 

Hijikata was already eating in silence (and it _was_ dry, tasteless, and Hijikata morosely added mayonnaise to the list of things he was bringing to the next wedding. _So many weddings_ …) when Gintoki made his way back to the table, balancing enough food for three people.

Freckles coughed indelicately when Gintoki sat, shrugging and grinning when Hijikata rolled his eyes at her.Hijikata ducked his head again, picking at his dry rice and trying to ignore the rolling, easy way Gintoki spoke.

And the way everyone at the table fought for his attention.

 _Asshole_ , Hijikata thought bitterly, gulping painfully around a mouthful of chicken.

The man across the table, who was absolutely, without a doubt, out of his mind drunk in his damn paper crown, told Gintoki he owned a law firm.And that he wished he’d brought enough crowns for everyone.Gintoki hummed, low and proud as if he was the man’s own father, as his knee knocked into Hijikata’s.Hijikata quietly fumed and shoved his leg away.

He crammed another bite of chicken into his mouth.

The man offered Gintoki his crown.Gintoki tilted his head, like he was actually considering wearing it.Hijikata choked on rice.Then he said, “I don’t think I could pull it off quite like you,” with a wink.Hijikata let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.He didn’t think he could take the crown look on Gintoki again.Gintoki pushed his water towards Hijikata with sideways glance and a lopsided grin.

Hijikata chugged the entire glass and wished Gintoki didn’t look so pleased about it.He shoved Gintoki’s leg away again.

Freckles purred and leaned around Hijikata to tell Gintoki about her publishing company, not to be outdone.Hijikata might as well have been invisible, which was fine by him, but—

He bristled, ducking his head closer to his plate to get out of the way of their conversation.If he mashed the chicken with the rice, it was a little less… lacking.

Gintoki’s knee knocked into his again.

Hijikata knocked it back.

Gintoki laughed his horrible laugh and infected the entire table with it.His leg splayed out to press up against Hijikata’s again and Hijikata gave up.

“I’ve read your book,” Gintoki said.Hijikata finally looked up and caught Gintoki smiling at the young woman who’d asked how they met.So she _was_ a writer.She turned scarlet and looked down at her plate.“It’s one of my favorites,” Gintoki said.Hijikata hated the gentle tone of his voice even more than he hated the way his laugh rolled like the ocean.The woman’s face broke into a smile so genuine and lovely that Hijikata nearly smiled in response before he managed to clench his jaw.

Hijikata looked away from her to glare at Gintoki, but he was startled to find he’d eaten more than half of his food.He opened his mouth to ask how the fuck Gintoki managed to put away that much food when he never shut up when Gintoki’s leg pressed against his more firmly.Hijikata looked down and inhaled, sputtering as all his air when down wrong.Shoved between Gintoki’s thighs was a huge tupperware container, mostly full of the dinner Hijikata realized the man hadn’t been eating at all.

Come to think of it, Hijikata thought, he hadn’t done that much talking either, letting the actual wedding guests at their table show off.

 _You clever bastard_ , Hijikata thought.

“Hijikata?” Gintoki said.His fingers twitched against his thighs.

“Goldfish,” Hijikata wheezed.

Gintoki offered him a smile that had Hijikata thinking of cherry blossoms.

Freckles whistled.

“Do you _mind_?” Hijikata groaned, voice rough and sore.He thought there was a wad of rice lodged somewhere in his chest and it _hurt_.

Gintoki’s cheek dimpled before he turned back to the writer, taking a sip of Hijikata’s water, since Hijikata had chugged his own glass.Hijikata watched the line of his shoulders sag slightly and he frowned, but Gintoki was off again.

“You’re self-published, I read,” he said to the writer.Hijikata pointedly did not watch Gintoki smoothly spoon the rest of his dinner into the tupperware while he somehow set the writer up with Freckles the Publisher.For a job (though the redhead looked like she wanted to devour the writer—gently and after an expensive dinner and even more expensive wine).Paper Crown hooted and offered up his best lawyer, which turned out to be the quiet man beside Freckles.  He'd had somehow never met anyone at the table before, though he _had_ read articles about Hijikata he admitted with a light flush, and he looked pleased to finally meet his boss, in his quiet, hair-flopping-into-his-eyes sort of way.

Hijikata wondered if he was, in fact, on a bad soap opera.That sort of thing wasn’t above Sougo.

Gintoki stretched and heaved a pleased sighed, bending like he was coughing and shoving the tupperware into his bag while the women exchanged numbers across the table.Then he leaned back in his chair, absently pressing at his stomach with his fingertips.Hijikata would bet his favorite lighter the man was starving.

Served him right.

The stupid bastard.With his ridiculous hair and barely-buttoned shirt.Hijikata sighed and it could have sunk Atlantis all over again.

“I’m still hungry,” Hijikata heard himself announce.“Going for seconds.Come on.”He glared at Gintoki.Gintoki’s eyes widened and his fingers froze against his stomach.Hijikata snatched up his own plate and stalked over the the buffet without looking to see if Gintoki was following.As he was dumping more rice onto his plate and wondering if he was above begging the kitchen for mayonnaise, Gintoki slipped in beside him, too close once again, carrying his empty plate.

“So you _are_ a goddamn idiot,” Hijikata said flatly.

Gintoki put food on his plate like someone was about to snatch it away.“I like food,” he said.

Hijikata looked sharply at him.

Gintoki popped a bit of chicken in his mouth right off the buffet and grinned.“Mmm,” he hummed around the mouthful.He swallowed and winced.“Bit dry, actually.”

Hijikata’s mouth twitched.He swallowed as well and looked away, refusing to laugh.“Eat that,” he snipped, “or I’ll tell the table I’ve never met you in my life.”His laughter died in his chest as the words left his mouth.The irritation humming down his spine felt different from before.Heavy.

“I only brought one container,” Gintoki shrugged, not looking up at Hijikata as he filled his plate.

“You owe me,” Hijikata said.

Gintoki looked at him with his oddly colored eyes.He tilted his head.“Sure, if you like.”

Hijikata felt a growl building.“If I _like_?”

Gintoki hummed and nudged him out of the way to get at the ketchup again.

“If _I like_?I got you dinner.”He thought of the tupperware.“Two dinners.”

Gintoki glanced up with an expression Hijikata neither trusted, nor liked.“Did you?If you hadn’t gone along with it, I had a backup plan.”

Hijikata’s grip on the plate tightened.“Then why the fuck did you—” he thought about saying, _Bother?Pick me?Say you were my goddamn friend?_ Instead, he settled on a snarl.

Gintoki was still looking at him with that expression, caught somewhere between curiosity and his manic grin.“You’re funny.”

“Fuck you.”Red was creeping into the edges of Hijikata’s vision and the overwhelming urge to dump rice in Gintoki’s messy hair had his fingers twitching.

Gintoki glanced at Hijikata’s hands like he knew.“I’ll get you dinner, to make up for it.Since I _owe_ you, and all.”

“Never mind.  Forget it,” Hijikata snapped.“I don’t want a damn thing.”

Gintoki shrugged.“If you say so.”Hijikata could smell his breath as he spoke, sour from hunger, and realized he was inches away from Gintoki’s face.

He sighed deeply, feeling a faint zing of satisfaction when Gintoki blinked, looking startled.“You could say thank you,” he said wearily, pulling back.

Gintoki quirked his mouth.“Chicken’s a bit dry, but thanks.I owe you one.”He winked.

Hijikata closed his eyes and counted to ten.When he opened them, Gintoki was gone, walking back to the table with much less food than he’d taken the first time.Exhaustion rolled down his body instead of irritation this time.

The table had rearranged itself when Hijikata returned, the writer having taken his seat—Hijikata’s chest ached gently at how happy she and Freckles appeared with the turn of events—so he shrugged, distantly happy for them and took the writer’s empty seat instead.His leg felt cold.  He considered asking what Freckles' actual name was.  Gintoki probably knew it.

He looked down at his plate, not in the least bit hungry.

Someone coughed loudly enough to be heard over the babble of the other guests.“’Scuse me.”Gintoki was beaming across the table.Hijikata opened his mouth (to say _what_ , he hadn’t the faintest clue) before he realized Gintoki wasn’t speaking to him, but instead to Paper Crown, who Hijikata hadn’t even noticed as he sat.“Would you mind trading seats with me?”

The writer lifted her head up to smile in their direction.  Hijikata remembered the man was the one who owned the law firm and wished he had eaten enough fast-food meals to supply an army with flimsy crowns.“I’ve got a few questions for you,” she said.  "If you don't mind?"

“Sorry, Vice Chief,” the man said, clapping a sweaty hand to Hijikata’s shoulder as he stood.“Work calls.”His words were fuzzy at the edges with whatever he’d been drinking.Hijikata blanched when the writer winked at him.People kept _winking_ at him.

Hijikata pointedly did not watch Gintoki relinquish his seat with an obnoxious flourish and make his way around the table.“Missed me?”Gintoki slid into the chair next to him, not looking up at he began to shovel food into his mouth.

“I don’t even know you.”

“Harsh,” Gintoki mumbled through a mouthful.

Before Hijikata could say anything, the lights dimmed.Hijikata jerked his head up in surprise, frowning.Gintoki was looking at him out of the corner of his eye.“First dance,” he mumbled, grimacing around another swallow.“This shit is seriously dry.Why are you frowning like that?”

Hijikata had forgotten why, exactly, he was there in the first place.He didn't answer,cramming an unlit cigarette into his mouth and pushing his plate towards Gintoki.He hoped Kondo was drinking water.

Gintoki’s knee pressed against his under the table as he leaned over to pick at Hijikata’s plate, and Hijikata watched him instead of the bride and groom.The song they’d chosen got lodged in his throat with the wad of rice from earlier.Gintoki ate like a stray dog Hijikata noted absently.Halfway through the song, Gintoki looked up, catching Hijikata's eye.He raised a brow and pushed the plate back towards Hijikata, who shook his head.Gintoki shrugged and ducked his head to shovel more rice into his mouth.His leg burned against Hijikata’s.

Hijikata wanted to shout that Gintoki had nearly face-planted tripping over the leg he was insistent on pressing against.  And he desperately wanted to know _why_ it mattered so goddamn much to him that Gintoki remembered.It seemed unfair.  The whole damn thing.

When the first dance ended and Hijikata could breathe again, dislodging the song and the memories from his throat with a hacking cough, Gintoki was the one that clapped the loudest.Hijikata cast a sharp glance at him to find his eyes glued on the cake.

“This is it,” Gintoki said, clapping a hand to Hijikata’s shoulder.The gesture reminded him of Kondo, and he ignored Gintoki, fishing for his phone.

He had twenty-two text messages.

The first five were Kondo declaring his undying love for Hijikata, each one getting more colorful as, Hijikata assumed, he got more and more drunk.

One requested, politely, that Hijikata committed seppuku in somewhat graphic, precisedetail.Hijikata breathed a sigh of relief, knowing Kondo had company.

The next apologized for the previous text and reassured Hijikata that Kondo loved him.Eventually, in a meandering way, Kondo told Hijikata he was free to leave after the first dance.Or at least, that’s what Hijikata assumed he was going for between the typos, death threats, and Kondo’s explicit thankfulness.

Hijikata coughed, missing them very much, and sent back, “ _Drink water_ ,” before putting his phone away.The cake cutting was finished and Gintoki was gone.Hijikata was free to go.He was pushing back from the table when a plate rattled down in front of him.A glob of frosting fell off the side, landing in a sickly sweet puddle on the tablecloth.Hijikata looked up with wide eyes to find Gintoki heaving himself back into his current chair with his own plate, looking pleased beyond reason.

His grin, when he met Hijikata’s confused expression, was genuine and boyish.“I should have brought more tupperware,” he sighed and crammed a horrifyingly large forkful of cake into his mouth.

“You’re disgusting,” Hijikata said.

Gintoki grinned around the mouthful, cheeks puffed out like a squirrel.He swallowed hard, eyes watering.“Yep,” he said happily.

Hijikata glanced at the door.Gintoki tapped at Hijikata’s plate with his fork.“Don’t waste that,” he pouted.Hijikata frowned.The air-conditioning at home was broken anyways and getting to sleep was sweat-drenched torture sleep. _Blame it on inertia_ , he thought, leaving his ass stuck to the chair and apprehensively bringing a sliver of cake to his mouth.It was so sweet he shuddered.Gintoki’s grin widened.

 

“So,” Freckles was saying in a voice that reminded Hijikata of the frosting.“What about you?You believe in true love?”

Hijikata momentarily looked away from the dance floor where he’d been people-watching while he resolutely ignored the heat coming from Gintoki’s thigh against his or the way Gintoki ate off his plate again with irritating familiarity.He’d found it was better to ignore the man than to engage.Gintoki didn’t seem too put out by it, happy enough to work his way through his own dessert, then Hijikata’s with single-minded determination.Hijikata found the redhead watching Gintoki curiously.She tapped at her chin with one purple-lacquered hand, her other than flung over the back of the writer’s chair.

Hijikata stifled a groan and the feeling that he now genuinely liked two people at the table, turning back to the dance floor.Someone from the wedding party was doing a remarkable rendition of the robot.He briefly wished Sougo was there.

“Sure I do,” Gintoki replied, dragging Hijikata’s attention back to the table.“It’s right in front of me.”Hijikata flushed violently, a snarl on the tip of his tongue that too far was _too goddamn far_ , when he realized Gintoki was gazing down at Hijikata’s massacred dessert plate like he was about to lick it clean.The woman blinked, casting a startled glance at Hijikata, and didn’t even have a whistle at the ready.Gintoki looked up, a little glazed, to grin at her.“Don’t you?”

She smiled weakly and the writer went red from her hairline to her chest.

Hijikata pushed back from the table.

“Oh,” Gintoki said, licking at his fingers.“Are you going to dance?”His mouth curled, eyes lighting up with amusement.“Please tell me you're going to dance.”

“I’m going home,” Hijikata said shortly, suddenly so tired of the entire situation.He stood.

“Without dancing?”

“I don’t dance.”

Gintoki leaned back in his chair, gazing up at Hijikata.There was frosting smeared on his cheekbone.“You don’t have to be able to dance to dance.”

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Hijikata said for what felt like the hundredth time.

Gintoki frowned.“Did you want that cake or something?  I can get you more.”

“No, that cake was as bad as the chicken.”

Gintoki looked deeply affronted.

Something about the downward curve of his mouth and the droop of the corners of his eyes pissed Hijikata off.He turned to retrieve his jacket from the back what had become the writer’s chair, but a warm hand around his wrist stopped him.

Gintoki was still frowning at him.“Wait for a moment?” he said.Hijikata scowled at the hand wrapped around his wrist.Gintoki let go of him and stood.“Just a moment?”

Hijikata narrowed his eyes.Gintoki tilted his head, unreadable.“Fine,” he snapped and to his own considerable surprise, sat back down.

 

Gintoki was gone for more than just a moment, leaving Hijikata to watch as everyone from their table got up to flit off to the dance floor.Paper Crown—who seemed distressingly sober at this point for having such bad moves—towed three people up with him, like he needed as many casualties as possible.Freckles stood and bowed to the writer, offering her hand, which, to Hijikata’s immense surprise, the writer kissed.The redhead seemed stunned as well, and it was endlessly satisfying to watch her flounder.Hijikata definitely liked the writer best, whether Yamazaki and Gintoki liked her works or not.

The soft spoken lawyer asked Hijikata if he was going to dance.Hijikata shook his head and the man shrugged, smiling gently.Hijikata wondered if Kondo would have been able to get him up there.He missed Kondo all over again, fiercely.

And where the _fuck_ was Gintoki.Hijikata glanced around the empty table and stood, feeling like a very tired fool.

“ _Wait_ ,” came a low, familiar voice.Warm as sunshine.

Hijikata scrubbed a hand down his face and turned to find Gintoki grinning sheepishly at him, a drink in each hand.His—Hijikata assumed it was Gintoki’s given that it appeared to be a goddamn strawberry daiquiri—looked suspiciously half-chugged already.

Gintoki held out a beer and tilted his head, raising his brows.

“Took your damn time, didn’t you,” Hijikata muttered, but he took the drink and sat heavily.

Gintoki sank down next to Hijikata, dragging an empty chair around and kicking his feet up on it.“Listen, I had to work for those.”

Hijikata raised a brow and tried not to show to fucking _good_ the cold beer tasted.

“Cash bar, y’know?” Gintoki said.“Anyways, now we’re even.”He clinked his glass to Hijikata’s.

Hijikata was about to shove the drink back, unable to stand the idea of Gintoki buying him anything, but Gintoki placed his hand at the base of Hijikata’s drink like he’d expected it.He waved his other hand dismissively.“Don’t worry, I didn’t pay.”

“That’s even worse!” Hijikata sputtered.

Gintoki took a massive slurp of his drink, licking some whipped cream off the straw.Hijikata was genuinely worried about his health for a moment.“Not me,” Gintoki said.He grinned.There were seeds in his teeth.“She did.”He inclined his head towards the bar across the room and Hijikata’s stomach flipped.The woman from the reception raised a glass of something amber at him and smiled.

Hijikata wished she was _his_ aunt.

“We’re not even at all,” he told Gintoki, raising his glass back to the woman, who he was pretty sure he loved.“And who the hell paid for yours.”

“My good looks.”Gintoki slurped his drink and got whipped cream on his nose.

Hijikata’s mouth twitched.

Gintoki glanced up when Hijikata didn’t laugh.“What?”

“Are you for real?”

Gintoki tilted his head.“Sometimes.”He rubbed at his nose, crossing his eyes trying to look at the tip.“What?You don’t think I’m pretty?”

Hijikata thought cherry blossoms were pretty.And kind people who bought him drinks.And the writer as she smiled and leaned up to kiss the redhead on the dance floor just now.  And freckles and things like sunshowers, fresh snow, and the way Shimura Tae looked at her fiancé.Hijikata thought of flower crowns.

“No,” he said.

“Ouch,” Gintoki replied mildly, licking his fingers again.He shrugged and put on a lopsided smile.“So, you come to these things often?” he teased.

“Not as often as I’m guessing you do.”

Gintoki grinned around the straw in his mouth.“Wanna know a secret?”

“Not really.”

“Too bad.”

Hijikata took a long swallow of beer.“I didn’t think you were giving me a choice,” he shrugged.“Just being honest.”

Gintoki pouted, but his mouth was tight like he was trying not to smile.He leaned forward, too close.His breath might as well have been spun of sugar.“I’ve never been invited to a wedding before.”

Hijikata snorted.“Is that supposed to be surprising?”

Gintoki leaned back and threw a hand over his heart.“ _Hijikata_ ,” he whined.

Hijikata’s brain went momentarily to static.

Gintoki tapped under Hijikata’s chin.“Still hungry?” he said.“Fishing for flies?”

Hijikata batted his hand away.“I will bite you,” he warned.

“Or you could arrest me.”Gintoki settle back in his chair, clutching his drink and looking immensely pleased with himself.  "Or both," he shrugged.

Through that static in his brain, Hijikata asked, “Are you... completely batshit, or an adrenaline junky?”He stared at the bizarre man next to him with his wild silver hair and weird eyes and ridiculous reasoning, looking better than anyone had a right to with his shirt undone halfway to his jeans.  And who might, beyond reason, be flirting with him, Hijikata, the thorny, friendless Vice Chief of Police.  The blood in Hijikata's ears made it hard to hear the music.  Something hot shivered up his spine.

“I don’t see why I couldn’t be both,” Gintoki said calmly.“But I actually just like cake.”

“Enough to crash weddings?”

Gintoki tilted his head.“I _love_ cake,” he amended.

Hijikata wondered about the food in his bag and then wondered some more about those kids he’d seen Gintoki with.Maybe that hadn’t been the same, reckless man beside him.He glanced at Gintoki’s hair, though, and thought that _no_ , he’d recognize that hair anywhere.Unfortunately for him.Gintoki wasn’t looking at him, though, he was quietly watching the dance floor.His mouth has gone soft on a smile and Hijikata realized he’d caught sight of his match-making efforts kissing and giggling with that wobbly kind of new-love excitement.

“I don’t get it,” he said.

Gintoki turned his gaze back to Hijikata.“Cake is good,” he said.

“Shut the fuck up about cake for a moment.”

Gintoki gasped, hand going to his chest again.But his eyes flickered with amusement.

“What do you do?”

“In life?Or, like, in general?”Gintoki cocked his head, and didn’t wait for an answer.“First off, _Vice Chief_ , I attend a lot of weddings.”  

Hijikata rolled his eyes.

“I enjoy cooking.” 

Hijikata narrowed his eyes.

“And baking, too, okay?  I'm just not as good at it.”  He sighed tragically.

“What a shame.”

“I’m a good dancer, and I’m handy with a chainsaw.One time I helped an author get a publishing contract.”Gintoki’s dimple was back and he looked at the dance floor.“And I think I look as good in a dress as I do in a suit.”He frowned.“Not that I wear a lot of suits.  Actually, I think I wear dresses more than I wear suits, which is something I hadn't realized until just now.”  He flicked a glance at Hijikata and shrugged.  "Thanks for that," he grinned and tapped at the side of his head.  There were still seeds in his teeth.

“What the _fuck_ ,” Hijikata said.“I was wondering what you did for a living.I don’t need a list of shit you think you’re good at.”

Gintoki took a slurp of his vibrantly pink drink. _Cherry blossoms_.Hijikata added strawberry daiquiris to the list of things he thought were pretty.“I _am_ good at those things.Are you always this negative?”

Hijikata dragged a hand down his face.“I’m _not_ negative.”

“Or shy.”

“For fuck’s sake!Don’t bring that up again.”

“Are you not dancing because you have to shit?”

“ _Gintoki_ , I swear to god.  I will arrest you.”

Gintoki smiled brilliantly.Even in the dim lighting Hijikata could see a faint flush on his cheeks.Hijikata was reeling.He thought he might have whiplash.

“You used my name,” Gintoki purred.“We’re real friends, now.”

“You—are a child.”Hijikata bared his teeth to stop from flushing.He wished the shivering up and down his spine would _stop_.

Gintoki just shrugged.“That’s not a bad thing.”He noisily inhaled the last of his drink and sighed, forlorn.“Oh, my point was my friend is getting married.”

Hijikata definitely had whiplash.“How the fuck is that relevant?”

Gintoki reached for his drink, and Hijikata, too stunned to say much, let him take a gulp of beer.“It’ll be my first.”

“Hardly.”

Gintoki waved a hand and offered Hijikata a sip of his own beer.“You know what I mean.I’m excited.Weddings are fun.Especially when you know people there.”

Hijikata, snatched his drink back, took a messy swallow of beer and offered Gintoki another mouthful, thinking he wouldn’t know, since he’d never been to a wedding that fit that criteria.Gintoki raised a brow as he accepted the offered beer.Hijikata shrugged.“You ate the rest of my food.Might as well, asshole.”

Gintoki was quiet for a while passing the beer back to Hijikata between sips, and making soft, idle comments about some of the dancers that had Hijikata swallowing snorts of laughter.

“I hope you aren’t sick,” Hijikata said, without bite.He felt mellow, the beer burning warm in his stomach.“With anything contagious, I mean.”

Gintoki hummed absently.Hijikata realized he was close enough for him to hear Gintoki’s hum over the music.“You sure you don’t dance?” Gintoki said.His voice was low.

Hijikata glanced at his face to find his lids drooping low, eyes more brown than red in their softness.  He nearly added that color to his list.“Positive,” he said.

Gintoki nodded.“That’s better than being negative.”

“You are a pain in the ass,” Hijikata said, ignoring the way Gintoki just made that humming noise and leaned closer with a muzzy, “I thought I was a child.”

Hijikata took out his phone to check the time, surprised to find it was past ten o’clock.He had paperwork to get done tomorrow.A heavy weight against his side startled him.“Are you drunk?” he blurted, staring down at Gintoki in disbelief, nearly getting a mouthful of curly hair.

Gintoki yawned.Hijikata felt it shudder through Gintoki’s body.“’m just tired.”  His voice was muffled against Hijikata's shoulder.For a moment that left Hijikata’s ribcage feeling brittle again, he could hear the man saying “ _’m not that old, jeeze_.”So Hijikata flicked his forehead.“Oi, let’s go, then.”

“Where are we going?”Gintoki let Hijikata haul him to his feet.

“ _I’m_ going home.You can go wherever the hell you want.”Hijikata shrugged on his suit jacket, wincing because it was still damp from before, and shoved Gintoki’s bag into his chest.“Go dancing if you want.Don’t forget your food.”

Gintoki gave him a funny look, but took the bag, trailing quietly after Hijikata who offered the woman from the chapel a grateful wave (getting a wink in return) and left the reception without another word, thinking he never wanted to be winked at again as long as he lived.

Apparently, Gintoki did not want to dance.

The street outside was oppressively quiet and sticky with lingering heat that turned the lights hazy.Hijikata tugged at his shirt collar.The air was wet enough to drown them.Gintoki watched him with the same sleepy, lidded expression he’d worn inside.

Hijikata opened his mouth—to say _what_ , he once again had no idea, _fuck off_ , maybe—but Gintoki beat him to it.

“Thanks,” he said.“This was fun.”

“It wasn’t,” Hijikata said.

Gintoki cocked his head, eyes brightening slightly.“Well, I had fun.”

“Good for you,” Hijikata said.

“It’s okay to admit you enjoyed yourself,” Gintoki continued.“I won’t tell anyone, Vice Chief.”Gintoki winked.

Hijikata crammed a cigarette in his mouth and finally, finally lit it.He heaved a sigh and a cloud of smoke.“You’re an asshole.”  It felt good to say it out loud.

“I’ve been told.”

Hijikata rolled his eyes and turned to go.

“Thanks,” Gintoki said, his voice sliding low.

Hijikata looked over his shoulder.Gintoki wasn’t smiling, but he didn’t look on the verge of passing out anymore.  He looked serious, which surprised Hijikata.Hijikata nodded curtly and turned to go again.

“Say, _Hijikata_.”

Hijikata froze with his back to Gintoki.

“You clean up well, you know.”Hijikata hated that he knew somehow his voice well enough to hear the smile in it.“But, I’ll be honest.  The cherry blossoms looked better on you.”

Hijikata’s spine burned hot.He turned with a snarl, but Gintoki had his back to him, already walking away with one hand thrown up in farewell.

“You fucking asshole,” Hijikata hissed.

Gintoki’s shoulders shook with laughter and his wave turned to a thumbs-up before he shoved his hands into his pockets.Hijikata stared at his retreating figure, fuming—noticing for the first time that he’d stuffed his jeans into beat-to-shit leather boots of all things to go to a _wedding._

Something horribly like laughter and even more terribly like _relief_ had him choking on cigarette smoke.

Hijikata was halfway home before he realized Gintoki had never told him what he did for a living.The urge to ask him was an itch that settled under Hijikata’s skin, just along his spine.

 

 

Before he reached his apartment, Hijikata stopped at a corner store on a whim.The beer had him craving something salty, but the books on a rack by the register caught his eye.On the shelves, with shitty romances and magazines and cheap bestsellers, was a book Hijikata thought sounded familiar.It was neither a bestseller, nor a romance, as far as Hijikata could tell.  In fact, seemed to be about sentient robots of all things, which was just so _Yamazaki_ it hurt.But Hijikata’s mouth curved into a faint smile when he opened it and saw the author’s picture on the inside cover.  He could tell her smile was a little forced because he knew her genuine smile was a lot more gummy and a lot more lovely.He bought three copies.The cashier looked at him like he was crazy, so he added a packet of peanuts to the pile with a nod.

Hijikata shouldn’t have been surprised to find Kondo and Sougo passed out on his couch when he finally let himself into the apartment.Kondo seemed to have thrown himself over Sougo’s legs and Sougo leaned up against the armrest with his eye mask on and a bottle of water tucked under his arm.There were beer bottles _everywhere_.And one frightfully demolished bottle of vodka.

Sougo stirred when Hijikata had accidentally turned on the lights before realizing his friends had broken into his apartment again.He lifted a corner of his eye mask and blinked at Hijikata for a moment before shrugging and closing his eye again, letting the mask fall back down.

Gintoki felt like a dream and Hijikata half-hoped he wouldn’t return to haunt him when he shut his eyes.His skin buzzed under the stream of cold water in the shower and he could still feel Gintoki’s leg against his.  It was very realistic for a dream, and kind of pleasant for a nightmare.

Just before Hijikata drifted off, he felt bright, traitorous burst of something he decided not to name.  Gintoki remembered him.

 _Asshole_ , he thought, nearly smiling.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would die for Dadtoki. And Zura.
> 
> [Banjiya Blues](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGkzRsZvRrw), baby.

 

Gintoki woke, as he did most mornings, to a lump of fur on his chest, a sore back from sleeping on his threadbare futon, and a voice like an alarm clock blaring in his ear.

“Gin-chan? Gin-chan.Gin-chan!” 

Gintoki rolled over and gently smothered Kagura with her gigantic stuffed animal while she flailed and shrieked.The white fur smelled a little musty; he really needed to clean that sack of germs.Same as usual.

What wasn’t normal was the fact that his pupils didn’t ache when he blinked his eyes open and Kagura’s voice didn’t feel like it was cleaving straight through to his brain.Briefly, he thought she’d spared him and left his blinds closed that morning, but no, buttery yellow sunlight was definitely making him squint.He closed his eyes, sighing into his pillow, waiting.

The headache didn’t come.

Instead, with a fizzling jolt, Gintoki’s brain was flooded with memories of the Vice Chief of Police turning various shades of red while—Gintoki assumed—he tried not to strangle him.Or bite him, apparently.Gintoki squeezed his eyes shut tighter. _Well_.That was much better than his usual haze of half-remembered weddings.

Kagura wiggled out from under her stuffed animal and peeled one of his eyelids back,peering at him with her own sleep-crusted eyes, hair sticking out wildly.Gintoki laughed despite himself.

“I’m hungry,” Kagura announced.She smushed the stuffed dog’s paw against his mouth before he could say, “ _Cool, I’m Gin-chan_.”So Gintoki played dead, falling limp and muffling another laugh when Kagura shook his shoulders and informed him, in a serious tone that only a kid could pull off, that she was going to starve to death, and _did he even care?_ He felt so light that morning, he might float away.

Gintoki finally let Kagura shove him onto his back.She looked at the tears oozing out of the corners of his eyes and the wheezing laughter burbling out from between his firmly pressed lips, and declared, “Gin-chan is sick.”She got up, leaving him staring at the ceiling.

Gin-chan was definitely sick. 

_“Are you… completely batshit, or an adrenaline junky?”_

_Oh, both. Unfortunately_ , Gintoki thought, wishing Hijikata had laughed more last night.  Gintoki liked the noisy way he'd laughed.

He heard the kitchen cabinets banging and sat up abruptly— “ _Wait, Kagura!_ ”He had a tupperware full of food and Kagura was about to burn the kitchen down.

 

Gintoki managed to herd Kagura into the bathroom with the promise of a buffet after.She eyed at him suspiciously and told him if she passed out from starvation in the shower, she was holding him responsible, so Gintoki was true to his word, rearranging the jumbled mess from the tupperware on plates across the low living-room table so that it looked somewhat like it had at the wedding last night. 

Gintoki thought, before he could stop himself, of grabbing Hijikata’s hip and turning him to face the buffet, and what it might have been like if Hijikata _had_ danced.Would he have let Gintoki hold his hips and press up against his back?  Probably not.  His prickles would have torn Gintoki's hands first.

And besides, that was last night and this was today and Hijikata—with his growling, dry voice, and those eyes and— _Enough,_ Gintoki snarled to himself.  Hijikata was gone, more dreamlike than anything, and Gintoki might as well have been Cinderella.   He folded up the desire to see if Hijikata laughed when he danced and put it somewhere for a rainy day, ignoring the way it burned at the edges as he very carefully put a lock on it.

It was a shame Gintoki really didn't mind prickles.  He hated boxes and locks.

 

The look on Kagura’s face when she came out of the bathroom with her school uniform on over her favorite pair of red leggings—the ones Gintoki had sewed hearts into when they tore—lit Gintoki up from the inside out like a dilapidated Christmas tree. 

[ _“See?”_ he’d said as he presented the mended leggings. _“High fashion.”_ He actually couldn’t afford to get the kid a new wardrobe until next school year and was terrified she was going to hit a growth spurt, but Kagura had run her fingers over the heart-shaped patches with a look on her face a lot like the one she now regarded the miniature buffet with.Of course, she had also asked Gintoki if the patches were from his old sleep shirt (which they were), but he’d said, _no_ they were from his _heart_.Clearly.]

Now, Gintoki swallowed around the puffed-up beat of his heart, hoping she didn't notice.

Kagura looked at the buffet, then at Gintoki, and then at the buffet again.She nodded solemnly.“You did good, Gin-chan.”She clapped a hand to his back and knocking his heart loose in his chest. 

Gintoki laughed so loudly that Kagura joined in, looking somewhat bewildered, unsure why, exactly, they were laughing.But she seemed to have long ago figured that sometimes Gintoki just did weird things like that, and she rolled with it because Gintoki let her do things like play their quest game out in public, which she just _knew_ was something old people like Gin-chan didn’t usually do.

“Get going, monster,” he huffed, “You’re gonna be late.”

Kagura sat on the couch, slapped her hands together and bowed her head.“Eat while you can,” she declared, still solemn.

Gintoki snorted and left her to make coffee and toast, hoping the kid left something to take for lunch.

“Gin-chan?”

“Yeah?” Gintoki called from the kitchen.The toast was moldy;  _fuck_ the humidity.

“I’ve decided I’m ready.”

Gintoki poked through their cabinets, coming up with jam and crackers and instant coffee.He tilted his head.He could work with that.“Hmm?” he replied around a mouthful of stale cracker.

“Yup.”She sounded pleased around her own mouthful.At least _she_ didn’t notice how goddamn dry the rice was.Gintoki was hit with a sudden memory of Hijikata wincing hard to get a bite of chicken down, eyes watering.   That ridiculous heart of his flopped like a dying fish even as he pressed his mouth against a grin and tightened the locks. He arranged the crackers in a nice design on a plate. 

“That’s really great, Kagura.” 

He made his way back into the living room with his coffee and crackers.Kagura eyed his plate pointedly.He sighed and held it out for her so she could pop a cracker into her mouth and nod her approval.Gintoki offered an amused smile and held his hand out.Kagura stole a sip of his coffee, wrinkling her nose as she passed him a chunk of chicken.“Too sweet,” she grumbled and returned to her own plate.

Gintoki looked at the lump of chicken in his palm before settling at the other end of the couch, balancing his plate on his lap.He held the chicken out for Kagura to snatch back up.“No chicken for me, this morning.Have at it.”  At least she had learned to share food, in her own way.  That had been like reasoning with a starving dog.

Kagura nodded, plucking the chicken from his hand and cramming it in her mouth. “Not sweet enough for Gin-chan.”She eyed his coffee with a betrayed expression.“Aren’t you supposed to stop—”

Gintoki coughed.“So what, exactly, are you ready for?” he asked.He took a large, noisy gulp of coffee.

Kagura froze, chopsticks hovering in the air.Gintoki braced himself.“I’m ready to join the business,” she said, nodding to herself, peaking at Gintoki out of the corner of her eye.

Gintoki blinked.

“The family business.”

Gintoki’s heart ached a little.

She turned to look at him square on.“I think it would be best if I quit school and went straight into the family business,” she said with devastating finality, and then returned to eating her breakfast.

“I see,” Gintoki said.Her hair was drying in waves on one side and frizz on the other.She looked like she was eight years old all over again.Gintoki thought maybe she was right and the last year or so  _had_ made him old. 

He tossed a pillow onto the floor in front of him.It said a lot for their impending argument that Kagura sat primly to have her hair done for school without questioning it.Gintoki sensed victory.“Would you be up for negotiations?”

Kagura twisted to look at him, ruining the braid Gintoki was working on.She pursed her lips.“Lay it on me.”She held out her hand, palm up, and beckoned with her fingers like she’d seen a mob boss do on TV last week.

Gintoki regretted letting her watch TV with him. _Live and learn_ , he thought wearily.He restarted the braid.“If you finish school, I’ll give you the whole business.”

Kagura twisted again to look at Gintoki with wide eyes.Gintoki tsked and turned her head back to face front.“Stop squirming, worm,” he said.

“I’m not a worm, I’m a queen,” she sniffed.

“Worm Queen.”

“Queen Worm.”

Gintoki smiled and waited.Kagura finished her plate and let Gintoki turn her hair into something he was a little proud of while she picked at his toes.When she decided he was done _fussing_ , she climbed back up onto the couch, kneeling.Apparently she wanted a height advantage.“The whole entire business?” she asked dubiously.

Gintoki nodded.“The whole thing.If you finish school.”

Kagura crossed her arms.“You didn’t finish school.”

Gintoki raised a brow.“Yeah?And look at me.”

Kagura did look at him, not really understanding rhetorical statements or the fact that Gintoki didn't actually own a family business.She poked seriously at the corners of his eyes, tugging at his hair like she was going to find darker grey hidden in the silver.Gintoki huffed and held still.

Kagura shrugged.“You just look like a sad old man.”

“Brutal,” Gintoki said.

Kagura cocked her head and frowned, poking at his cheeks, just over where he’d been told his face dimpled.She sniffed the air near his face and Gintoki’s heart hurt again when she smiled.“Less sad today.Still old.”

Gintoki laughed a little brittlely.“Well, one out of two, not bad.”

“I don’t want to _own_ the business,” Kagura said like Gintoki was a complete idiot. 

“Well, you’ve got plenty of time to decide.”

“I didn’t agree to anything, _Gintoki_.” _Ah_ , Gintoki thought, there was the full-name.It was a real fight, then.

“No,” he said calmly, “but Shinpachi is going to be here soon and it would be rude to have made him walk all this way for nothing.” 

Kagura leaned back and crossed her arms again.“Shinpachi should sleep over, then,” she dismissed.

“Are you going to brush your teeth before school?”

Kagura offered Gintoki the iciest, blue-eyed glare he’d been leveled with since he told her that no, she couldn’t force the kids at school to call her “Her Majesty,” and that the time-out she received for bullying was, in fact, justified.The look of betrayal over that spat still haunted Gintoki’s sleep.

Kagura sniffed when he didn’t say anything else.“I’m not forgetting this, Gin-chan.”

Gintoki nodded.“Noted.Tabled ’til tomorrow.”He put his hand over his traitorous heart.

Apparently, this appeased the kid enough to get her to go brush her teeth while Gintoki packed up the mess she’d made of the buffet for lunch, relieved to see there was still some food for dinner.

He sent a mental thanks to Hijikata.  Under the rattling lock, burning at the edges, he wondered why Hijikata hadn't told him to fuck off from the get-go.  He certainly deserved it.

Along the line of his leg, from his hip to his knee, he could still feel the man's warm, sturdy muscles.The Hijikata's leg twitched when something surprised him.Gintoki was glad he knew that, at least.

He let that memory stay outside of the flimsy compartment he was trying to shove the rest in.

 

When the doorbell rang, Kagura glided past Gintoki with another cool glare, opening the door and telling a harassed-looking Shinpachi that she not at all pleased by these arrangements.

Shinpachi looked helplessly over her head at Gintoki.Gintoki shoved a hand through his hair and tried not to smile.

“Gin-san,” Shinpachi said, ignoring their fight in favoring of stepping around Kagura, whoadamantly refused to turn around to look at Gintoki.He held out a crumpled piece of paper.“Got a job for you.  From one of Otae's friends.”

 _That_ got Kagura’s attention.Her head shot up.“I’m ready,” she said.

Gintoki read the note and frowned.Construction. _God_ , he hated construction.

Shinpachi winced a little at his expression.“I know,” he said, apologetic.

Gintoki shrugged.“Thanks,” he said. _I’m handy with a chainsaw_.He let out a loud bark of laughter startled both Shinpachi and himself.

Kagura appeared to pat Shinpachi’s shoulder.“Gin-chan is sick today,” she said knowingly.

Shinpachi studied Gintoki in a way that made him squirm.“Actually, you look good today, Gin-san.Less old.”

Gintoki winced.“Two out of two.It’s a good day for Gin-san.”

“We’re going to be late,” Kagura sniffed from the doorway.Gintoki smiled.“Gin-chan, don’t forget to walk Sadaharu.”

“’Course not,” Gintoki said.

Kagura did not look convinced.

“Don’t burn down the house without me.”

Gintoki laughed.“I’ll try not to.”

“Kagura, we’re going to be late.”

“Shinpachi, do not rush me.”

Shinpachi dragged a hand down his face.

“ _Go_ ,” Gintoki said.“I’ve gotta get to work.I dunno what you fools are doing, but if you get detention, I’m withholding ice cream.”

Kagura launched herself at him and Gintoki took an affectionate elbow to the stomach as she hugged him like a boney octopus.The next moment they were both gone to school, leaving the front door wide open.

Gintoki scribbled on the piece of paper, _Ice Cream_.

 

Gintoki stopped by Otose’s on his way down to the street.She took one look at him and rolled her eyes, pointing to a stool at her bar.

“You were back early last night, Gintoki,” she said when he had a mouthful of eggs and jam and toast.

He groaned.Fuck, eggs were so much better than crackers as a vehicle for jam.

Otose raised an eyebrow and blew out an elegant puff of smoke.Gintoki tried not to think of Hijikata, and failed miserably.He wondered what the Vice Chief of Police did in the mornings when there weren’t cherry blossoms for him to brood in.He frowned and tried to fold that thought back into its place.  It burned a little more than before.

Gintoki swallowed.“Yeah,” he said.“I’m getting old.You’d know…”He winked at her.

Otose snorted.“You’re a brat.”

Gintoki nodded and shoveled more eggs into his mouth.“I’ve been told,” he said around the food.He crammed the last bit of food in his mouth and stood, holding up the paper Shinpachi had given him, with the address and job description.“Construction,” he sighed.

“Maybe you’ll pay me back for breakfast, then.”Otose raised her brow again, looking a lot like hell would freeze over first.

“I thought you made me breakfast because you loved me,” Gintoki grinned.  They both knew she was feeding him because he'd actually paid rent yesterday and couldn't afford groceries.

“Hmph,” she grunted.“Get out of here.You’re taking up a spot for an actual customer.”

Gintoki looked around the empty store.“I see that…” he said.

Otose swatted the back of his head as he turned for the door.“Don’t be late, asshole.”

Gintoki tossed a wave over his shoulder and left the door to the shop wide open.He looked at his scooter, chained in the space between their stairs and Otose’s shop, then at the cloudless sky.He decided he had time to walk.

He’d rather do any job besides construction.

 

 

The walk to the job took him by the park. _That_ park.It was Kagura’s favorite because, once, they had met a dog there that allowed her to pet it.  Generally animals avoided her like the plague, so she immediately declared it her lucky park (Kagura had a lot of lucky places in the city).Gintoki liked it because it was near a convenience store that carried a brand of popsicles he liked.He wasn’t sure why Shinpachi liked it.Probably because Gintoki made an effort to buy them said popsicles if he could.Even in the winter.Unless Kagura insisted on hot chocolate.

Gintoki hesitated at the gate to the park.  He really didn't like construction...

Suddenly there was Kagura, vivid as anything in his memory, eight years old and so small that her new stuffed dog, which Gintoki had had to beg her to leave at home, dwarfed her.She was staring up at him with an expression that terrified him. _Gin-chan, milk is good for my bones.That’s what you always say.Do you want my bones to break?_

_Hot chocolate doesn’t really count, kid._

_Then neither does ice cream._

It was hot as hell and Gintoki hadn’t the faintest clue what to do with kids beyond the fact that they seemed to like him for some reason. 

_It’s too hot for hot chocolate_.

Approximately two minutes later, Gintoki was buying two shitty diner hot chocolates from a boy that stared anxiously at Kagura like he’d never seen a kid crying before.

 _Uh, extra whip_ , he said.

The kid gulped and nodded, nearly dislodging his glasses.

 _Whipped cream doesn’t count either, Gin-chan_ , hiccuped the monster perched on his hip.

_If whipped cream doesn’t count, then hot chocolate definitely doesn’t, kid._

_My name isn’t ‘kid,’ it’s Kagura._ She spilled her hot chocolate on his shirt.The boy behind the counter winced and pushed napkins their way.But Gintoki didn’t care because there were all sorts of bells chiming in his head, and they sounded less like alarm bells now.If anyone knew how to talk to a child, it was Zura.

 _Sure thing, Your Majesty_ , Gintoki grinned.He tipped the boy at the till more than he could really afford.

 

Outside the park, Gintoki nearly got run down by a bicyclist and shook himself, hot as hell in the present and probably late for work.  He suddenly wanted to see Hijikata.Right that moment.Walking out of the park with flower petals in his hair and much more likely to snarl at Gintoki than to smile.Which Gintoki kind of liked, because Gintoki liked prickly things, apparently.  And Hijikata's laugh.  A lot.  He was probably the type to snort and open his mouth too wide when he really got going. 

Gintoki wiped a sweaty palm again his jeans, thinking that the sturdy press of Hijikata’s leg had been something like reassuring.  

He snorted at himself and turned his back on the park, shaking his head.It wasn’t like Hijikata had been back to there since he’d bolted before Gintoki could apologize properly, so Gintoki doubted he was there today.  

He was only an hour late for the job, which was practically early by his standards.

 

 

The job turned out to be a week straight of roofing that left Gintoki’s hands blood-blistered, and his face sunburned.He thought his hair might be crisped enough to break off.Kagura and Shinpachi would never let it go if he went bald.He didn’t hesitate at the entrance to the park again after that first morning.He took his scooter, figuring he’d be too tired to walk back at the end of the day.Roofing was, in Gintoki’s opinion, the purest form of torture.  But at least it kept him busy.  He got better at compartmentalizing again.

Kagura examined Gintoki’s hands when he finally told them the job was over with a stern frown on her face.She agreed to share her pint of ice cream with with minimal sighing, and insisted he smear some on his nose because her teacher had told them to ice burns, and they definitely didn't have ice in their freezer.There wasn’t room with all the food Gintoki was able to buy.

“I think I will finish off this year, Gin-chan,” she told him, eyeing the worst of the blood-blisters like it might explode at any moment.“The children have finally accepted me as their Queen, and it wouldn’t be right to leave them now.”

“I think that’s a great idea, Kagura,” he managed before passing out on the couch to the sound of Shinpachi dragging her through her homework with a little less bickering than usual.

 

The next morning, it was Shinpachi who woke Gintoki rather than Kagura.The sun wasn’t up yet, and Gintoki considered the possibility that this was hell.His muscles burned enough to be on fire.

“Gin-san?” Shinpachi whispered.

Gintoki didn’t open his eyes.“Shinpachi, is someone dying?”

“Other than you?”

Gintoki’s mouth twitched.The kid sounded like he was sitting on the couch above his head, so Gintoki grabbed hold of a cushion and gently lobbed it in that direction.There was a soft _oof_. _Direct hit_ , Gintoki thought with distant, pained satisfaction.

He waited for the cushion to collide with his own face.

Nothing came.

He opened his eyes.

Shinpachi perched on the edge couch, chewing his lips.His glasses were askew.Gintoki closed his eyes again.“Shoot, kid,” he said, turning his head so one of his ears was tilted in Shinpachi’s direction.

“It’s nothing.”

“If you woke me up for nothing, _you_ will be the one dying.”Gintoki heaved himself upright with a groan and plucked Shinpachi’s glasses from his face, putting them on.He realized there was only glass in one side and swallowed.He placed them back on top of Shinpachi’s head like sunglasses.

Shinpachi frowned at him, fixing his glasses.

“Is Tae leaving you the dojo, or something?”

Shinpachi startled, and then shook his head.Gintoki frowned back at him, tilting his head, considering.Sometimes talking to Shinpachi was like twenty questions, and sometimes the kid went in for the kill in a way that impressed Gintoki more than he’d ever admit aloud.This morning seemed the twenty questions sort, which meant Gintoki was right that he was worried about his sister.

“So she’s keeping it when she gets married.”

Shinpachi drew his legs up and rested his chin on his knees.“Kyuubei’s really keen on running it with her.”

Gintoki was silent for a moment.“What about you?”

“They said I can run it with them.”

Gintoki nodded and waited.He looked at his own toes, which Kagura liked to pick at when she was thinking hard and they were sitting side by side.Shinpachi held perfectly still when he was thinking. 

Shinpachi was quiet so long, Gintoki had mostly resolved to make them both coffee while he waited.He was heaving himself up off the couch with another grunt that Shinpachi normally would have teased him about, when Shinpachi wrapped two fingers in the sleeve of Gintoki’s shirt.

Gintoki settled back on the couch.“I think Kagura needs a bigger bedroom,” he said.

Shinpachi let go of his shirt and sat very still, very close to Gintoki.  A year ago, he might have pressed himself against Gintoki's side.It was bitterly amusing to Gintoki that he probably missed that more than Shinpachi did.“How long is Kagura staying with you?”

Gintoki glanced sideways.“As long as she wants.”

Shinpachi nodded, staring blankly down at table.

“I’m in a construction kind of mood, Shin-chan.”

“You hate construction.”

“I’m a changed man.”He stretched his arms above his head, worried he’d pulled every single muscle in his back, watching Shinpachi’s fingers twitch towards his shirt sleeve again.“Anyways, bigger bedroom for the monster.Any other requests?”

Shinpachi shook his head.“It’s your place, Gin-san.”

“Mostly, it’s Otose’s.”

Shinpachi looked at Gintoki out of the corner of his eye.Gintoki realized it was obvious the glass was missing from that lens.He wondered how long Shinpachi had been squinting and why he hadn't noticed. 

He shoved a hand through his hair.“I want a guest bedroom,” he continued.

Shinpachi huffed.“Where would you put that?”

“The loft,” Gintoki said.“This place has an attic.”

Shinpachi frowned.“Really?”

Gintoki nodded.“It’s where I store all my literature.”

Shinpachi let out a real snort of laughter at that.

Gintoki smiled.“Feeling homeless is scary,” he said easily.“But sometimes you think you’re feeling one thing, when you’re feeling another.”

Shinpachi flushed just dark enough to see in the dark and he shoved the cushion into Gintoki’s face.Gintoki’s yelp woke Kagura, who came crawling out of her tiny bedroom to settle between Shinpachi and Gintoki, grumbling endlessly as she did so.

“Gin-chan,” she yawned, irritated.“You should not interrupt beauty sleep.”

Gintoki let her rearrange his arm so she was tucked up under it, giving her stuffed dog to Shinpachi for safe-keeping.“Right,” Gintoki said.“You should keep that in mind tomorrow morning when you get the urge to peel my eyelids off.”

“I said _beauty_ sleep, Gin-chan.You smell.”

Gintoki laughed too loudly again, shaking Kagura, who snarled pathetically and did not join in with his laughter this time.He looked over at Shinpachi and quickly pretended he hadn't when he realized the kid was crying silently, holding the stuffed dog like he was nine years old, as well.

Gintoki’s chest hurt.He reached out to land a hand in Shinpachi’s hair, nearly taking his glasses out in the process.

“Kagura,” Gintoki said.

“Gin-chan, I am _sleeping_.”

“Fine,” he said.“Shinpachi, what’s your favorite color?”

“Mine’s red,” said Kagura.

“You’re asleep,” sniffed Shinpachi.  "And everyone knows that."

“ _You’re_ going to get snots all over Sadaharu,” Kagura shot back, cracking a baleful eye open to glare at him.She looked at Gintoki’s hand in Shinpachi’s hair and the tear-streaked mess on Shinpachi’s face, and heaved a long-suffering sigh.“I guess that’s fine.You’re washing him, though.And he doesn’t like to be washed.”She nodded to herself and crash-landed back against Gintoki.

“What day is it?” Gintoki asked, taking his hand from Shinpachi’s hair to hang limply around Kagura, who was seemed to be cold.

“Saturday,” said Shinpachi.

Gintoki heaved his own sigh.“Oh, thank fuck.”He let his head roll back against the couch, eyes sliding shut, and kicked his feet up on the table on front of them.

“Gin-san?”

“Mmm?”

“I like blue.”

Gintoki smiled.“I figured.”His brain was losing traction, sliding back off into sleep.Thank _fuck_.

“Gin-san?”

Gintoki made a soft, strangled noise.“Shinpachi, kid, I would do anything for you, please know that, but for the love of god, let me sleep.”

“Ah.  Actually, I woke you up partly because there's another job.  Someone stopped by around dinner, but you were sleeping.”

Gintoki lolled his head to the side and cracked an eye open to look at Shinpachi, who seemed remorseful enough that Gintoki just sighed.“Today?”

Shinpachi nodded.

Gintoki swallowed a groan.“Please don’t tell me—”

“It’s not roofing.”

Gintoki’s entire body sagged.

“It’s painting.”

Gintoki wanted, so badly his bones ached, to curl up beside the ridiculous kids on his couch and pass out for a decade.“I like painting,” he said instead.In all honesty, he sort of did like painting.

“You don’t have to take the job, Gin-san.”

Gintoki was sorely tempted.He looked around the room.There was takeaway pizza he didn't remember order on the table near his feet.  He bet Shinpachi would pass him a slice if he asked.Shinpachi looked ready to pass out with him, and Kagura was warm where she burrowed into him, ever the squirmy worm.She’d left the pillow fort under the table set up, and Gintoki wondered if that’s where Shinpachi had slept.  His heart, which had behaved itself the last week, began to feel a bit too big in his rib agains, getting stuck on a thump somewhere at the base of his throat.  It was quiet and dark in the apartment, and he wanted to stay there.  And, horribly enough, it turned out Gintoki must have locked part of himself in that box along with Hijikata's laugh and his stupidly expressive eyes, because that bit of himself that drifted when he was overtired coiled around a warm thought of Hijikata, aching with a dull, quiet pang.  His heart was probably better off sewed into Kagura's leggings after all. 

He hoped Hijikata wasn't lonely.

He smiled at Shinpachi.“I _love_ painting,” he amended.He stood, scooping Kagura up to deposit back in her pitifully small bedroom.She growled in her sleep at him.“Think I can get away without showering?” he asked Shinpachi, taking the stuffed dog from him and putting it in bed next to Kagura, tucking her feet beneath her fraying quit.

“You’re disgusting,” Shinpachi said absently.

 _You're disgusting_.  The flare of wanting to see Hijikata started at Gintoki’s toes and burned hot all the way up to the roots of his hair, incinerating the fragile hold he had on it.  He thought he might be a coward.  It had been a while since he thought that.  It felt too much like coming home and he hated that bitterly.

“Gin-san?I was joking?I mean… you are, but.Why are you looking like that?”

Gintoki grinned.“Like what?” he said, rubbing at the back of his neck.  

Shinpachi looked nervous and narrowed his eyes.

Gintoki softened his face.“Can you make sure the monster eats today?”

“That’s not very hard.”Shinpachi still looked on edge.  His eyes skipped over the dimple on Gintoki's cheek.  Gintoki stopped grinning.

“I’m fine.Just remembered we ran out of toilet paper,” Gintoki said.  He carefully did not run his hand up through his hair. 

 

 

The setting sun bathed the red-light district ethereally gold while Gintoki bought new glasses and blue paint and a bottle of mayonnaise with the money he’d made that day.The cashier gave him a sideways look that had him swallowing laughter.Gintoki caught sight of himself in a shop window a few minutes later and realized he had red paint flecked like blood throughout his hair and all over his face.  A large glob dripped down his collar bones and onto his chest.

A familiar mop of red hair collided with said chest while he was looking at his reflection.

“ _Gintoki!_ ” exclaimed the woman in front of him, wrinkling her nose happily, making the smattering of freckles crumple together.

Gintoki tilted his head.“You…” he fumbled.“ _Hey_.”

The woman swatted his arm.“I’m in a hurry,” she said and winked meaningfully, which made Gintoki enormously happy, even if he still struggling to remember her name.“But listen, you’ve been invited to the wedding this weekend, right?It’s quite highbrow.The food should be _magnificent_.”

She was practically vibrating.

“Of course,” Gintoki said.He kind of wanted to hug her to make sure she didn’t vibrate her way off the planet like a little star.

“Well, I mean, I figured, since, you know.”

Gintoki nodded.  He did _not_ know.“Absolutely,” he said.

“I _knew_ it.” 

Gintoki did place his hands on her shoulders then.  They were sun-warmed and so alive with their excited shivers and he was glad he'd met her. 

“I have to go, but I’ll see you Saturday, okay?”She darted up to press a kiss to his cheek, smudging deep purple lipstick over the red paint.“Thank you,” she said softly.

“Of course,” Gintoki said, still somewhat bewildered.He paused, "Eh, Hoshi-chan.”

The woman grinned.“I like that,” she said and took off up the street with the power walk that must have been watch catapulted her into Gintoki’s chest in the first place.Next time, he would call her Suisei.

Hopefully next time she would mention her name.

He wondered if Hijikata knew it.Probably.The Vice Chief of Police must know things like that.Gintoki wondered if he’d be at the wedding—

Oh. _Oh_.

Gintoki loved that freckly, gingery angel with his whole entire heart.

He might just shiver his way off the planet with her.

 _Are you... completely batshit, or an adrenaline junky?_ Absolutely both.Gintoki laughed and a passerby looked like they might call the police.Which made him laugh harder.  He knew one that might want to bite him.  

He undid some of the chains on the box and let out a bit of that horrendous, fizzling want.  He felt less like a coward.

 

*

*

*

 

Technically, Gintoki owed Hijikata three meals.The morning Hijikata sold his soul to Kondo and the wedding season, Gintoki had received enough money to actually pay that month’s rent in full.

Kagura had taken one look at the envelope and let loose a grin far too evil to grace the face of someone so young.“Is that from Auntie?” she asked.

Gintoki grinned back.“C’mon, we’re getting Shinpachi.”

“You can get a new dress,” she said.“A red one…” 

“You can’t wear it if I do.”

“Can I have your old one?”

“No.”

Kagura sniffed.“Zura would let me.”

“Zura is a fool.”Gintoki hoisted her into a piggy-back and crashed down their stairs, nearly taking out a very surprised Otose who hid something like a smile behind the paper fan she broke out whenever the weather turned nice.

 

They kidnapped a startled Shinpachi from his home and bought too many snacks at that corner store Gintoki liked so much.He had enough money to buy both the novel he’d been wanting to read and the lastest  _Jump_ and he thought that surely the other shoe would fall soon because he was so happy he could float away.It was a relief that Kagura and Shinpachi held his hands as they tugged him into the park, keeping him tethered to Earth.

 

“I should have brought Sadaharu,” Kagura sighed, stretched out on a patch of sunny grass.“He’d love this.”

“Sadaharu would need a bath after this,” Gintoki said.He frowned and tried to remember how Zura used to make those flower crowns when they were little.“He hates baths.”Gintoki recalled vivid green eyes staring out from under a ring of daisies, bright and hopeful, and painfully young.His fingers slipped.

“Shinpachi,” he said.“More grass.”

Shinpachi eyed him.“Grass?”

“Yeah, it’s the glue.”Gintoki sighed away the memory and closed his eyes, hunting for a more recent one.  About a year ago now, just after the Hot Chocolate Incident and just before the kid from the till started lurking around the Snack Shop, Zura had sat Gintoki down on his balcony while Kagura napped.He had a basket full of flowers of all things, a handmade quilt tucked under his arm, and a deadly serious expression on his face. 

 

“Gintoki, you cannot be a father and not know how to make flower crowns.”  It was incredible how one sentence could set off so many pain receptors.

“Zura, I’m not a dad.”

“And I’m not Zura, but that doesn’t seem to stop you, either.”

Gintoki’s lungs felt very tight and his stomach hurt.Katsura was watching his face carefully.“What?” he barked.

Zura’s mouth curved on that smile Gintoki hated.Most people did not smile so gently at Gintoki.“Just looking for bald patches.I hear that comes with fatherhood.”

“I’ll give you a bald patch, _Zura_.”

Zura smirked and flicked his hair over his shoulder.“Jealous?”

Gintoki was not jealous, exactly.He had, at least, long ago learned how to braid hair.So he might be a shitty dad that couldn’t make flower crowns, Kagura wouldn’t go to school with a rat’s nest for a hairstyle.He thought he might be grateful.

“Of a wig?No, I’ll go buy my own, thanks.”

Zura gave Gintoki one last careful look before shrugging.  He tucked a flower behind his ear.“Grass is glue,” he said solemnly.

 

Gintoki nodded to Shinpachi, who did not look at all convinced.“I’m telling you, grass is glue.”

Thirty minutes later, Gintoki had managed to force together enough flowers to make a crown that would have had Zura in stitches.He placed it on Shinpachi’s head and clapped the kid on the shoulder.“Told ya,” he said.

He turned to Kagura and was about to ask if she wanted one too, when he caught sight of the expression on her face.“Kagura…”

“Gin-chan,” Kagura piped with wide, wide eyes.

“Don’t trust her,” whispered Shinpachi.Gintoki glanced at him, with the flower crown slipping off to one side and a bit of a sunburn starting on his nose, and nearly smiled.When the other shoe fell, Gintoki thought it was going to topple cities.

“ _Gin-chan_ ,” Kagura pouted.

Gintoki narrowed his eyes.“What.”

“Can I do your make-up?”

Gintoki frowned and looked at her empty hands.“I’m beautiful without makeup,” he said.

“Zura would let me.”

“Zura is a fool.”He had to invite Katsura over soon.Kagura had brought him up enough to get the point across.

Kagura sighed heavily and cast her eyes at the sky.“Can I at least do your hair, then?”

Gintoki put a hand in his hair, catching his fingers on a snag.He looked at Shinpachi, who’d gone back to reading _Jump_ , humming happily to himself, and at Kagura, who had smears of chocolate from her chin to her forehead.

He lowered his head and closed his eyes.“Good luck,” he sighed, trying not to smile.He might as well enjoy it, he figured, while he could.

 

“Can I add a beetle for decoration?”

“ _No!_ No living things.”

“Fine.”Kagura tugged on his hair again and a pile of leaves slid down the back of Gintoki’s shirt.He shuddered and piled more blossoms into his lap, plucking them out of the leaves where they’d fallen.“Are you nearly done?Surely I didn’t need that much primping.”

“This is what you do to me before school,” Kagura sniffed.

“I do _not_.”Gintoki did a _fine_ braid.He was going to ask Zura when he came over.

“I told you not to trust her, Gin-san.”

“You are a traitor, too,” Gintoki shot back.

“Okay!” Kagura sounded too pleased.She sat back on her heels and grinned at Gintoki.“Much better.”

Gintoki frowned as a stick flopped into his eyes.

“And now for the makeup.”

“Kagura, _no_ —”

Tiny, dirty hands clapped against his cheeks and she managed to get a streak of dirt across his forehead and down his nose before Gintoki was launching himself to his feet, armed with cherry blossoms, and taking off after her.

Kagura seemed to think that was as good a game as dress up, and Gintoki was gaining ground until he tripped over a beautiful man sitting in a halo of cherry blossoms like he belonged there.

 

“Uh, Gin-san?” Shinpachi wheezed from where he sprawled on the ground.Kagura had a knee on his chest and Gintoki had somehow wound up with the flower crown on his head.“Shouldn't we—”

“I win,” Gintoki blurted, pointing to the crown on his head.His heart flopped against his ribs and he thought was probably going into cardiac arrest.  His brain was a traitor as well, looping a startled _"Pretty!"_ over and over and over.

“Yeah, but isn’t it—”

“Gin-chan shouldn't we apologize to the man you almost ran over?”

Two sets of enormous eyes blinked at Gintoki.“Ah,” Gintoki said, painfully aware that the extraordinarily attractive man had just witnessed him with sticks in his hair, tripping over his own feet, with dirt on his face.  Not the best first impression, but certainly not his worst.  He'd actually been about to about to call out to the man himself when he realized he was already gone.   _Ah_.  The disappointment burned more than he expected, given that the man had seemed like a bit of a stony bastard.

He'd looked lonely.

Shinpachi used Kagura’s head to lift himself up, looking earnestly at Gintoki.“We should invite him.”

“To what?Have his makeup done?”

Kagura shook her head.“He’s pretty without it.”

“No loyalty.”

“Seriously, Gin-san—”

“Enough,” Gintoki sighed.“He’s gone.I doubt he wanted to hang out with us.”

Kagura looked truly baffled by that thought.“Why?”

Gintoki felt his mouth try for a lopsided smile.“Because he’s clearly super lame, kid.”

“Well then, he’d _definitely_ want to hang out with us,” Shinpachi said gently.His face reminded Gintoki of the way Katsura looked at him sometimes.  Gintoki didn't want to know the face he was making to get Shinpachi looking at him like that.  

He grinned harder and stuck his tongue out at Shinpachi.  "I'm clearly the cool one."

“The crown looks best on you,” Kagura said, nodding.She looked between Shinpachi and Gintoki with a face Gintoki wished she didn’t know how to make, either.It was accepting and gentle and everything she usually wasn’t.

Gintoki tossed a handful of cherry blossoms at her, which she pretended to bite out of the air.“We left our stuff,” he said, which had the kids scrambling back towards their picnic in the way people who had nearly nothing clung to what they _did_ have.

Gintoki hurried after them as well, fully aware that he was the same, except that what _he_  had were two kids that weren’t really his.When he passed the tree the man had been sitting under, he realized he'd had left his food behind in his hurry to get away.  It made Gintoki inexplicably sad.He took the meal home with them, for some reason unable to leave it abandoned there.

Zura played pirates with Kagura at dinner that night while Gintoki read his new novel on the couch.Shinpachi still held his _Jump_ hostage.

Kagura peered at the takeaway container Gintoki was picking at.“Are you eating Sadaharu’s dinner?” she asked horrified.

Gintoki started laughing and couldn’t stop.

“Gintoki’s a little sick today, aye captain?” Zura said to her, settling onto the couch beside Gintoki to riffle through the book he’d been reading.

“Arrgh, anyone who ate that would be,” she replied.

Gintoki sighed, hiccuping out another shuddering laugh.  He couldn't stop thinking that the man was lonely.  He dropped his head to rest on Zura's shoulder.  There were a lot of lonely people in the world and Gintoki was suddenly very tired.  Laughing too much did that to him.

Shinpachi frowned, the flower crown on his head now wilting.

 

*

*

* 

 

Gintoki crashed into the apartment wheezing.“Shinpachi,” he panted.

“ _Gin-san_.Do you need me to call an ambulance?”He stared at the paint flecked across Gintoki’s face in horror.“Please tell me that’s yours.”

“What the hell?That’s not what you’re supposed to say!”

“Well, _sorry!_ Let me try again.Gin-san, who did you kill?”

“It’s paint!” 

“Oh.”

Gintoki looked around.“Where’s Kagura?”

“On the balcony with Katsura-san.”

“Perfect.”

Shinpachi was looking at Gintoki like he was a time-bomb.“You’ve been seriously weird today.Weirder than usual.”

“That’s what happens when Gin-san doesn’t get his sleep.”

“ _Gintoki_.”There was a note in the kid’s voice that had Gintoki stopping in his tracks.He thought it was worry, and that had Gintoki’s stomach turning over, sour.  God, he was such an asshole.

"I forgot the toilet paper, but..."  Gintoki fished in the bag and pulled out a pair of glasses, handing them carefully out to Shinpachi.He thought the kid might cry again, but he just nodded curtly.  

“Thank you,” he said with a small smile.“You can pop the lenses out of my old ones and give them to Kagura, if you like.”

Gintoki grinned.“Do it yourself.”

Shinpachi’s smile widened.He turned to go, and then paused.“Why did you come in like that?Are you okay?”

Gintoki rubbed at his neck.“Yeah, I'm fantastic, just thought I'd get some exercise, you know?  Gotta fit into my suit.  There's another wedding this weekend.  Apparently the food is going to be _magnificent_."

Shinpachi frowned and held very still.Gintoki was afraid to know what he might be thinking.Then Shinpachi smiled faintly, rolling his eyes.  "You're both fools," he said.  "Get a cellphone."

 

 

Gintoki let Kagura do his makeup that night.

“Gintoki is sick again,” Zura said under his breath, showing Kagura how to do a cat’s eye.  Kagura's new lens-less glasses perched on his nose.

“What kind of sick?” Kagura whispered back, like she wasn’t inches away from Gintoki’s face.

Zura heaved a sigh and raised his brows meaningfully.

Kagura nodded.

Zura tapped at his heart and coughed to hide a laugh.

“So that’s why he hasn’t been out late… you _know?_ ”She raised her eyebrows like Zura had.

Gintoki nearly lost an eye.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gintoki, babe, Hijikata might not be the only lonely one.
> 
> You all have been so kind and generous with your comments, and so gentle with me, I'm honestly speechless. I wish I could properly tell you how ridiculously thankful I am. I don't know how to without yelping a lot, so I'm just going to try to pour as much love as I can into this story.
> 
> ❤︎❤︎❤︎
> 
> Hoshi: star  
> Suisei: comet  
> .... Gintoki's slightly more elegant way of calling her "Freckles."  
> And the debate over using honorifics continues...
> 
> The next chapter might take a wee bit longer to be posted, since I'd had a pretty big head start on this one.
> 
> [tumblr](https://kaguneko.tumblr.com)

**Author's Note:**

> *Waves and sweats* Thanks for reading! If you made it this far! I'm literally terrified! :) Uh, don't worry, it's not going to be all ocs at the weddings. I just needed some for this one.
> 
> I loved the Mitsuba Arc and have left their past in this fic as it was in canon. It's going to remain non-explicit and only referenced to, but it does tie in a lot with Hijikata's mindset and choices.
> 
> There's also gender-fluidity w/ Zura, nonbinary Kyuubei, and references to canon-compliant past character deaths. And while my goal for this fic is mostly fluffy, bittersweet falling in love, but I would hate to blindside anyone with angst, so! There is a bit of angst. Probably more than I originally intended.
> 
> Speaking of angsting, I agonized over the use of honorifics. Still debating... also I messed with their ages a bit, though Gintoki & Hijikata remain late 20s.
> 
> Mostly, I'm writing what I'd want to read... ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ *sweat drops* Anyways, I have 12 chapters plotted. for better or for worse... ;)
> 
> Like I said, if you made it this far, I love you. If you didn't, I probably still love you. I'm on tumblr at [kaguneko](https://kaguneko.tumblr.com). Which is a hot fricking mess. Ah...


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